PART 1.] 
Hughes : Iron-ores of Kumaon. 
15 
Thus we have the whole system of mountain ranges between the Indus and the borders 
of Turkistan bounded on the north and south by syenitio rocks, including between them 
the silurian, carboniferous, and triassic formations. This fact is rather remarkable, for, south 
of the Indus, we have nearly all the principal sedimentary formations represented from the 
silurian up to the eocene, and most of the beds abound in fossils. 
The only exception to which I can allude on the Changclienmo route is near Kium, in 
the Changchenmo valley. Here there are on the left bank of the river some remarkably 
recent looking sandstones and conglomerates, dipping at an angle of about 45° to north-by 
east, and at the foot of these beds rise the hot springs* of Kium. I think it probable that 
this conglomerate has eastward a connection with the eocene deposits, which occur at the 
western end of the Pangkong lake, and in the Indus valley south of it. 
In the previous notes I have scarcely alluded to the dip of the rocks at the different 
localities. The reason is that there is indeed very great difficulty in directly observing both 
the dip and the strike. At the western end of the Pangkong lake the dip of the metamorphic 
schists is mostly a south-westerly one, hut further on nearly all the rocks dip at a moderate 
angle to north-east, north-by-east, or to north. On the Lingzi-thang, just after crossing 
the Changlatig, the shales are mostly highly inclined, but further on the limestones lie 
unconformably on them and dip to north-east. Wherever the hills consist merely of shales 
and slates, their sides are generally so thickly covered with debris and detritus that it 
becomes almost an exception to observe a rock in situ. 
The debris is brought down in large quantities by the melting snow into the valleys, 
and high banks of it are everywhere observable along the water-courses. At a somewhat 
remote—say diluvial—period this state of things has operated on a. far greater scale. Not 
only were the lakes, like the Pangkong, much more extensive, but valleys like the Chang¬ 
chenmo, or the Tanktze valley, sometimes became temporarily blocked up by glaciers, or 
great landslips, and the shingle and clay deposits were often accumulated in them to a 
thickness of two or more hundred feet. Near Aktagh similar deposits of stratified clay exist 
of about 160 feet thickness, and extend over an area of more than one hundred square miles. 
There can ho but little doubt that when these large sheets of water were in existence, the 
climate of these now cold and arid regions was both milder and moister, and naturally more 
favorable to animal and vegetable life than it is now. A proof of this is given, for instance, by 
the occurrence of subfossil Succinece, Helices, and Pupa in the clay deposits of the Pangkong 
lake, while scarcely any land mollusk could exist at the present time in the same place. 
Notes on some of the Iron-ores of Kumaon, by Theodore W. H. Hughes, A. It. S. M., 
P. G. S., Geological Survey of India. 
In connection with the highty important subject of the establishment of iron works in 
this country on the large scale, I was called upon in October last by Government to investi¬ 
gate the mode of occurrence and to determine the quality of some iron-ores in the province 
of Kumaon. 
My attention was directed to no new localities; I was instructed to visit ground that had 
already been so reported upon, written about and discussed, that it possessed a literature of 
its own on the special subject of iron, of more than five hundred octavo pages.f 
* The temperature of these hot springs varies from 60° to 125°. They form no deposit of gypsum, like the 
springs north of Gogra, but there is a good deal of soda deposit round them. 
t Selections from the Records of the Government of India, No. VIII, 1855. 
» n ii „ „ „ „ Supplement to No. VIII, 1855. 
» *» »> >» jt i» »> >» n XVII, 1856. 
„ » » „ n „ „ „ „ XXVI, 1859, 
Report on the Government iron works at Deehource in Kumaon, by Thomas Oldham, Esq., 1860. 
